Anyone who tries to do something in this country to help the underclass usually winds up like the defenders of FSB Mary Ann: politically dead or wounded. It’s much more popular to help the middle class, like what Obama announced this morning.
President Barack Obama announced a series of policy changes Saturday aimed at making it easier for Americans to save money for retirement.
Among the changes are expanded access to 401k plans, small tax policy changes and a pledge to let workers convert vacation days into retirement savings…
As part of the policy shift, the government will enable automatic enrollment in 401k plans for small-business employees, a policy that has previously applied to only larger employers…
Second, a checkbox will be added to tax forms letting Americans receive their tax refund as a savings bond.
A modification in labor policy will allow workers to transfer unused vacation days into their retirements plans.
Finally, the IRS will create a “plain-English” guide to help Americans understand their options for retirement savings.
I’m sure that the crazies will come up with some theories about how the evil Kenyan government is trying to force us to save for retirement, but these kinds of reforms are simultaneously good policy and quite popular. This is the easy stuff. It helps people who vote.
It’s much harder to help people who don’t vote, or who vote in low percentages. It’s easier to help people play with their own money than it is to “spread the wealth around.” A successful left-wing party will create a mix of policies, some easy and popular and some difficult and contentious.
The big battle in health care reform is in creating access to health care for tens of millions of people (mostly from the underclass) without just forcing them all into becoming customers of a private corporate health insurer. Naturally, the insurers will trade some regulation and oversight for tens of millions (mostly healthy, for the moment) new paying customers. Forcing people to either spend money on health insurance or become a ward of the state in order to receive subsidies to pay for that health insurance, is not going to be popular.
Obviously, anyone who has made the decision to forego health insurance because of the cost is not going to be overly grateful to be compelled to change that decision unless the cost is vastly reduced and can comfortably fit into their budget. The public option is attractive both because it is the best mechanism for reducing cost and because millions of Americans object to paying for for-profit health insurance when most other industrialized nations have some form of national health care.
When you force millions into buying insurance (through a mandate) and then millions more have to accept government subsidies to pay for it (with whatever stigma attaches to that), then you are attacking people’s liberty and their pride. It’s a recipe for political disaster when you consider that most of the people who will benefit don’t even vote.
Normally, when the policy wonks and the political hacks agree about something, a party doesn’t ignore their advice. But that’s what we’re in danger of seeing happening with Max Baucus’s shitty plan.